MEET THE KEEPER OF THE CUP

By Gary Van Sickle

It was 1983 and the Ryder Cup was a home game for the Americans, literally.

The host course was PGA National, the resort a few blocks away from PGA of America headquarters in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. It couldn’t have been more convenient because the Ryder Cup is run by the PGA of America.

This Ryder Cup would be only the third time the U.S. team would face Europe, which was expanded from the traditional Great Britain & Ireland lineup in order to make the event more competitive after decades of embarrassing American dominance. Also, it would a showcase for golf’s newest superstar, Spain’s Seve Ballesteros. He won the 1979 British Open by three shots over Jack Nicklaus and Ben Crenshaw and the Masters for a second time earlier in 1983. He played exciting, swashbuckling golf, had an elite short game and was considered the European version of Arnold Palmer of Europe for his good looks and winning smile.

The Ryder Cup needed a boost because it was virtually a non-event for American golf fans. The tournament had a low profile and didn’t warrant live television coverage for most of its playing. In ’83, the Ryder Cup was still small time.

Which explains why Pete Wofford, aspiring 24-year-old amateur player who worked at PGA Natiomal, was able to become the so-called Keeper of the Cup in 1983. That’s the semi-sarcastic name his fellow golf shop employees gave him after he was charged with taking care of the precious Ryder Cup trophy in the weeks leading up to the event.

“There were a dozen of us who worked in the golf shop,” recalled Wofford, who lives with his wife, Lisa, in Mt. Pleasant, S.C. near Charleston. “The Ryder Cup was so small, most of us really didn’t even know what it was. We were even part of the opening ceremonies, we had to wear coats and ties.”

One of Wofford’s jobs was to help design, fill and maintain a showcase window along the hallway that connected the PGA National golf shop to the PGA Sheraton hotel. So the window was filled with samples of anything that carried the Ryder Cup logo—golf bags, logo balls, accessories, bucket hats (which quickly sold out) and photos of past American Ryder Cup players in action.

“Design-wise, what was missing was the actual Ryder Cup,” Wofford said.

Someone higher up in the PGA of America hierarchy thought that was a fine idea. The trophy was added to the display during the golf shop’s daylight hours, then stored for the evening. Wofford was in charge of making sure the trophy was secure overnight.

“They whispered, ‘Guard this with your life,’ but the staff had no worries about the cup to the locked showcase,” Wofford said. “The PGA of America trusted me and said, ‘Here’s the trophy, take care of it.’ Well, this little glass showcase wasn’t much. We had security people in the building at night but also a lot of vendors I didn’t know in the weeks before the Ryder Cup. I wasn’t comfortable leaving the trophy in its wooden box under my desk in the office.

“The behind-the-scenes workspace was too congested, I thought, and there were too many people passing by for the ‘guard-it-with-your-life’ mission I was given.”

There was a safe under Wofford’s desk but the Ryder Cup was packed in a box too big to fit in it. What to do? Wofford used common sense to solve the problem. Which is why he was dubbed The Keeper of the Cup.

“I put the trophy back in its box and just carried it home,” Wofford said. “I lived in a fairway condo about three long par-5 holes away. I usually walked to work or I’d take a golf cart during tournament week. When I got home, I took it upstairs and put it underneath my bed. I did that every day for about two weeks before the Ryder Cup.”

Other than his roommates, two other golf pros, nobody knew about this safekeeping procedure.

“The Ryder Cup trophy came in a small, felt-lined wooden box not much larger than a cardboard box of my size 14 shoes,” Wofford said. “Inside, there was a small recess for the trophy to fit in and a pair of white butler gloves, which I used to handle the Cup. It reminded me of the golden chalice I’d see every Sunday at church.”

The trophy is small as modern trophies go, about 17 inches tall. On top is a figurine of old-time English Ryder Cupper Abe Mitchell, although Wofford noticed there was a slight bend in the figurine’s golf shaft. He also noticed the lid didn’t fit tight and could easily pop off. He fixed that with some double-sided tape.

As the Ryder Cup approached, the PGA of America needed someone to be a liaison between the players and the PGA of America. Wofford was still an amateur and still harbored dreams of giving professional golf a shot. He was in the PGA apprentice program but hadn’t done anything yet. He worked the shop in the winter, collecting greens fees, cart fees and setting pairings. A lot of club pros played at PGA National during the offseason and they all knew easy-going Pete and knew he was a good player because he teed it up with them at times.

When he interviewed with PGA National, he said he wanted to either play professionally or work in the golf industry. He didn’t want to be a club professional, however. The PGA National staff made sure he could play in some tournaments and urged him to do Monday qualifiers for the Honda Classic or Doral tour events to see what it was like. He had the pros’ respect so he was an easy choice to be the player liaison. That made Ryder Cup week extra busy for Wofford.

“When the players got their team uniforms and blazers, Craig Stadler’s was about the size to fit Tom Kite and Tom Kite’s sure wouldn’t fit Stadler. I took them in the Buick courtesy care to a seamstress to get the jackets re-fitted,” Wofford said. “I was the only employee who had locker room access for the Ryder Cup. Both teams shared a locker room, believe it or not. A friend of mine was the locker room attendant. I was a face for the Ryder Cup players. ‘Hey, Pete, my wife wants to come out and do some shopping.’ So I arranged a Thursday night private shopping session for some of the wives in the shop. They bought logo shirts and hats for friend.”

The Keeper of the Cup was doing fine until Thursday, the day before the Ryder Cup matches began. There were dozens of request from assorted media to photos and video of the actual Ryder Cup trophy. Only the Keeper of the Cup could fulfill the requests. In 1983, remember, the Golf Channel wasn’t even a glint in founder Arnold Palmer’s eye. Most of the requests were from newspaper photographers who wanted a glamor shot of the trophy by the 18thgreen or placed discreetly in front of a water hazard.

Then came a guy from West Palm Beach’s local Channel 5. This on-air talent was panicky because he had to perform a “Live at 5” segment from PGA National and wanted to use the trophy for it. But he wasn’t well-informed about golf so he asked Wofford for help.

“I told him, a British guy from the BBC did a thing earlier today where he held up the trophy and talked to it like it was a puppet and asked it questions,” Wofford said. “He’d hold it to his ear after he spoke and then say, ‘What’s that? You want to go back to Europe? You don’t like it in America?’ It was pretty funny. He gave life to the trophy and had a back-and-forth conversation with it. This Channel 5 guy says, Great, let’s try that.”

Something got lost in translation, however. Wofford stood off camera by the putting green, ready to hand the trophy to the Channel 5 guy. Then the guy calls Wofford by name and puts the camera on him and identifies him as The Keeper of The Cup. Well, that wasn’t planned.

“He just asked a few basic questions and I answered. Like how big is the trophy, how much does it weigh, is that a wooden base, how long has the Ryder Cup been played, things like that.”

Somone else off-camera, no doubt one of Wofford’s co-workers, told him to ask where Wofford kept the trophy.

“I was on camera, I wasn’t going to lie,” Wofford said, chuckling at the memory. “So I told him the truth, I take it home and put it under my bed. Everybody there laughed. It was like a 30-second interview. A few U.S. Ryder Cup players were in the background and overheard me. They laughed and gave me a thumbs-up.”

Within seconds of the interview airing live, two PGA of America officials stalked out of their offices and rapidly approached Wofford.

“Steam was coming out of their ears,” Wofford said. “They didn’t say a word. I held up the Ryder Cup trophy and they took it and left. That was the end of me being the Keeper of the Cup.”

Nothing else came of the Channel 5 interview although it apparently gave the PGA of America the idea to have duplicates made of the Ryder Cup trophy and use them for photo opps and media events while the original trophy was kept in a secure location.

The Ryder Cup matches went to The Belfry in England in 1985. Wofford still worked for the PGA of America I the PGA National golf shop. That week, his fellow co-workers thought they were comedians.

“They liked to ask me if I’d seen the Ryder Cup trophy lately,” Wofford said.

Even the one-time Keeper of the Cup laughed a little as he repeated the old punchline.

by Gary Van Sickle

It was 2004 and Tiger Woods came to the Ryder Cup at Oakland Hills fully prepared.

For a dreadful U.S. thumping? For a marquee pairing with long-time rival and non-friend Phil Mickelson that proved disastrous?

Nope. Tiger came prepared for The Question. The one about why his Ryder Cup match record was an uninspiring 5-8-2 at that point after he’d played on the losing side in two of his first three Ryder Cups. The Question was finally asked to the No. 1 player in the world in a deferential, as-polite-as-possible way late in his pre-event media conference.

Tiger was ready and waiting for what amounted to criticism. “I’m sure all of you guys know what Jack’s record is in the Ryder Cup, right?” Tiger asked the assembled media.

Oops. Silence. The writers were stumped, if not stunned. “Anybody?” Tiger asked with a smile. “No?”

More silence. Then Tiger delivered the punchline.

“How many majors did Jack win?” Tiger asked. Dozens called out the obvious answer, 18.

“Oh, really? Okay,” Tiger said as laughter engulfed the media room.

Tiger made his point. Ryder Cup individual records don’t matter, so get off his back. Plus, he skated on actually answering The Question. It was a win-win for Tiger.

The real point of it all slipped past unnoticed. Nobody remembered Jack’s match play record, 17-8-3, for a simple reason. He never lost a Ryder Cup. He played in six Ryder Cups and the U.S. went 5-0-1 in them. The tie was in 1969, Jack’s Ryder Cup debut, when he conceded Tony Jacklin’s putt on the 18th green to ensure the matches ended in a tie, boosting morale in the traditionally out-manned Great Britain & Ireland team, and displaying golf’s special brand of sportsmanship.

Tiger’s record was scrutinized because he was the best player in the world, and he wasn’t getting results in the Ryder Cup. Neither were his teams. And that’s factoring in that Mickelson was the No. 2 player in the world. They were the modern version of Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer in that their talent was a cut above everyone else. And yet the U.S. was getting owned by Europe.

Let’s face it, if the Americans had won at Valderrama in 1997 and at The Belfry in 2002 in addition to their Miracle at Brookline win in 1999, nobody would have cared if Tiger had gone 2-13. Winning solves everything.

It all got worse at Oakland Hills that week. Tiger and Phil lost both of their matches on Friday. Europe sprinted to a 6 ½-1 ½ lead. It was never a contest. It was an embarrassment, really. And it was a home game, even worse.

As the Ryder Cup arrives this week in New York on Long Island, probably loudly, we should realize that we’re keeping score wrong in the Ryder Cup.

Wrong? As Tiger pointed out, forget the individual player records. The Ryder Cup is team match play. It’s all about the team, stupid. So, Ryder Cup players should be judged by how their teams fared, not how they fared.

This means it gets kind of ugly for the Americans, who have won only three Ryder Cups in the first quarter of the 21st Century. The U.S. is 3-8. Team USA would have to win the next five Cups just to get back to .500. Europe owns them, that’s just a fact.

The bad news for Tiger is, refocusing his Ryder Cup record on his teams’ performance rather than his own makes him look even worse. You may not believe Tiger’s record from the eight Ryder Cups he played. The U.S. was 1-7. Yes, that’s One and Seven. Tiger Woods won only one Ryder Cup.

Mickelson doesn’t come off looking any better. He remarkably played in 12 Cups and his teams went 3-9.

The U.S. team has won only three of 11 Ryder Cups this century. That means no American players are going to look good in the team record category.

Only one American who played in at least two Ryder Cups has a winning team record. You could have 30 guesses and not come up with J.B. Holmes, who played in 2008, when Paul Azinger out-captained Nick Faldo at Valhalla, and 2016 at Hazeltine National.

Where are the American studs? They don’t have winning records. Brooks Koepka, not on this year’s team, is 2-2. Dustin Johnson is 2-3. Justin Thomas and Jordan Spieth were an automatic duo for the U.S., but Thomas’ teams were 1-2 and Spieth’s were 2-3.

The worst team results featured Bubba Watson, 0-4; Webb Simpson, 0-3; and Rickie Fowler, Stewart Cink and Zach Johnson, 1-4. Including Johnson’s losing turn as captain two years ago, he is 1-5.

The current team features Scottie Scheffler, Collin Morikawa, Bryson DeChambeau and Xander Schauffele, 1-1. Harris English is 1-0. Captain Keegan Bradley, who made the unselfish move of not picking himself even though he deserved to be a player on this team, has never played on a winning side. His teams are 0-2.

The Europeans adopted this team view long ago. Playing on a winning Ryder Cup team is equivalent to winning a major for the Europeans. Ian Poulter, one of Europe’s greatest match-play assassins said a few years ago, “I wouldn’t swap all my Ryder Cup success for a major.” The Cup is that important. It involves national pride and, even better, sticking it to The Man—in this case, the U.S., a country of excess wealth, space and opportunity.

Poulter’s teams have a 5-2 record. Rory McIlroy’s teams have also gone 5-2. Justin Rose’s, 4-2. The Europeans’ records are as good as the Americans’ records are bad.

And the players who score the clinching points for Europe become legends for life. Graeme McDowell. Tommy Fleetwood. Francesco Molinari. Martin Kaymer. Philip Walton. Sam Torrance. Paul McGinley. And all the rest.

When Jack Nicklaus suggested the Great Britain & Ireland team be expanded to include all of Europe to give the lopsided Ryder Cup some better competition, and that idea was put in place in 1979, he thought it would lead to parity and make the Ryder Cup better.

Jack was half right. The Ryder Cup became tremendous. It is golf’s most thrilling and intense competition. Every stroke makes somebody happy.

But he was wrong about expansion creating parity. It went beyond that. The European side rules this event. Since 1985, it has a 12-6-1 record. Europe hasn’t lost at home in 32 years.

Heading into the matches at Bethpage State Park, we have a different Big Question: Why do the Europeans keep playing better as a team than the Americans?

Tiger? Anybody? No?

By Gary Van Sickle

OAKMONT, Pa.—The 125th United States Open’s final round turned into The Agony and The Ecstasy.

Of course, it was eight hours of mostly agony followed by five minutes of ecstasy but hey, a good dessert makes you forget a tough steak ten times out of time. When J.J. Spaun sank a 67-foot putt on the final green in the rain Sunday evening to win in electrifying fashion, he made the most memorable and important stroke in Oakmont Country Club’s storied history of hosting ten U.S. Opens.

Johnny Miller’s 63 was a more exciting round in 1973; Larry Nelson’s record weekend total of 132 en route to victory in 1983 was more impressive; and Ben Hogan’s 1953 Open when he blitzed the field by six was more historic. But nobody ever gave Pittsburgh a shocking jolt of adrenaline and joy like this. Finally, something to cheer about on what had felt like National Bogey Day until then and even better, a champion to cheer for instead of an anticlimactic Monday morning.

Sixty-seven feet for the win? That’s big even for basketball sharpshooter Caitlin Clark. And when Spaun’s putt dropped into the right half of the cup, the gallery absolutely thundered. At that point, they were wet and probably hangry, too.

Meet J.J. Spaun, your new U.S. Open champion, and the man who saved this tournament from an artistic standpoint after a day full of Oakmont Country Club once again asserting its dominance over the world’s best players. It was Black Sunday as most of the red under-par numbers dropped off the scoreboard nearly as fast as the hopes of Pittsburgh Pirates’ fans this season.

The last day was brutal, awful and just plain ugly as Oakmont made these world-class golfers look borderline inept. It wasn’t them, it was Oakmont. Was the course set up so hard that it negated ability and caused many of the world’s highest-ranked players to not be in contention? That’s for the furtive Golf Channel talking heads to decide.

Exhibit A of Oakmont cruelty starred the final twosome of Adam Scott and Sam Burns. They combined to shoot 17 over par. Even Spaun was a victim early, playing the first six holes in five over par and, apparently, taking himself out of contention. But he didn’t. Maybe his back nine performance alone should make him a candidate for Comeback Player of the Year. The man shot 40 on the front. Who shoots 40 on the front nine and wins when he isn’t leading after 54 holes? Nobody. Except Spaun, a former San Diego State University player.

The final nine featured a five-way tie for the lead, then a four-way tie, and one by one the contenders fell away at the end.

It all came down to the 72nd hole. Spaun, the tournament’s first-round leader, needed to par the final hole to edge Scotland’s Robert MacIntyre by one shot to win. In an incredible stroke of luck—and Spaun probably had that coming—playing partner Viktor Hovland hit his approach to the left side of the 18th green, just a foot behind Spaun’s ball and showed him the line.

The rest is instant replay history. Why did Spaun have a good break coming? At the second hole, his on-target approach took one bounce, clanged off the flagstick and cruelly rolled off the front of the green and 30 yards back down the fairway. It was not an easy bogey from there. Golf is a cruel game sometimes. Yeah, you said bitterly, most of the time.

The winning stroke gets more unbelievable, if that’s possible. Spaun intentionally did not check the scoreboard to see where he stood. “I knew based off what the crowd was saying that if I two-putted, I would probably win but I didn’t want to look because I didn’t want to play defensive,” Spaun said. “I didn’t know if I had a two-shot lead. I didn’t want to do anything dumb trying to protect against a three-putt or something.”

It is remarkable that Spaun didn’t know for sure but there’s more. When he got his first victory at the Valero Texas Open, Spaun’s ball was on the fringe of the last green, and Scott Stallings hit a bunker shot that landed near his ball mark and rolled right down to the hole. “When I was walking up to 18, I was thinking, ‘Oh my god, this is meant to be because this is the same thing that happened to me for my first win,’” Spaun said.

Then came the Spaun Heard ‘Round the World. More on that momentarily.

First, the stroke of genius that set up this win came after the par-4 17th hole. Spaun unleashed a driver, landed a stout tee shot just in front of the green and the greenside gallery roared as his ball trucked past the pin, missing it by less than two feet. The ball stopped about 15 feet above the hole, leaving him a slick eagle putt that would have all but iced victory.

Spaun carefully rolled that putt just past the hole, made the birdie tap-in to take the lead and faced the daunting task of making par at the big, bad 18th. To make it harder, after a nice drive in the fairway, it began to rain again and Spaun popped open his umbrella as he ambled off the tee box. Note the smart move by a veteran player: Spaun walked slowly up the fairway to keep his heart rate down. Keep it down? More like get it down after that birdie. It’s how a pro stays in the moment. Kids, DO try this at home.

You know how it ended. Spaun flipped his putter to whereabouts unknown—possibly the deep rough just off the green—while his caddie Mark Carens jumped all over him. In the clubhouse, MacIntyre watched a monitor. NBC smartly had a camera on him and Bobby Mac, as he is known, probably already figured he was going to come up short after Hovland gave Spaun the read on that monster putt. When it went in, MacIntyre clapped and mouthed in awe, “Wow.” In other words, pretty much like everyone else only a lot calmer and without expletives.

England’s Tyrrell Hatton was part of that five-way tie for the lead on the final nine and looked like he might be the guy to beat. But he ran into trouble at the 17th hole with an unfortunate severely downhill lie in the rough by the bunker and made bogey. He was talking to the media and keeping one eye on a monitor as Spaun putted.

Asked what he did during the rain delay, Hatton said, “I sat in dining—he’s holed it! Unbelievable! What a putt to win! That’s incredible!”

Hatton was asked what he thought Spaun was feeling just then. “Shock, I would guess,” he said. “Unbelievable. Fair play.”

Hatton shot even-par 35 on the front but it was the bogey at 17 that dropped him two strokes back that ended his chances. He shot 72 on the round. “I’m sad about how I finished but I’m very happy for J.J. To win a major in that fashion is amazing.”

Golf Channel analyst Paul McGinley gushed all week about Spaun’s on-target iron play and solid driving, and he wasn’t wrong. Spaun’s overall game is a cut above the average and at Oakmont, he really showed it off.

Maybe it helped his mental approach that he was distracted. Spaun said he had to run out to a drug store because one of his daughters, Violet, was vomiting all night long. “It was kind of a rough start to the morning,” Spaun said. “It kind of fit the mold of what was going on, the chaos.”

No better word describes what went on in the final round. Sam Burns and Adam Scott struggled and slipped away. Carlos Ortiz was in the hunt until a mistake-filled double-bogey at the 15th dropped him out of a tie for the lead. Hovland never got anything going. He made just two birdies all day but he needed one at the 17th to get within one of Spaun. Hovland needed to birdie the 18th to maybe get in a playoff if Spaun bogeyed but that’s when Hovland pulled his approach badly and helped Spaun go to school on the putt’s line by landing his approach right behind Spaun’s ball.

Maybe Oakmont’s setup was never intended to identify the best player. But it did identify the player who handled Oakmont’s full-court pressure the best.

When the last putt dropped, Spaun was embraced by his caddie and he held up one clenched fist in triumph. His cheeks were wet as he pulled off his cap and blinked. Was it the rain or were those tears of joy?

You know the answer.

By Gary VanSickle

OAKMONT, Pa.—Nobody gets a break at Oakmont Country Club. Nobody.

Also, nobody says, ‘Have a nice day’ during U.S. Open week. Because next to nobody ever has a nice day at Oakmont during the Open. Friday’s second round was another virtually joyless day of hack-outs, lip-outs and far more bogeys than birdies.

Even Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro had a tough day. He stopped by to praise the club and the area leaders and volunteers for all the hard work of hosting the Open, and all that, and of course maybe win over a few voters. The Governor gamely took a few questions. The first three were about golf. The fourth and involved protests. The fifth was about rising Middle East tensions.

“This is a real leap, by the way,” the Governor said. “We went from golf to protests and now we're going to go to the Middle East here?” He paused, smiled and said, “Anybody from the USGA want to take these?”

There were no volunteers for that. The Governor handled it himself. He was tough enough.

The supposed definition of U.S. Open golf is a strong layout that pushes golfers to their breaking points and sometimes beyond. Oakmont, the meanest beast in the Open Rota cage, excels at this. Some old-time golf writer, probably the great Dan Jenkins, dubbed this event the No Fun Open. It is holding true this week.

Friday, I watched Russell Henley make a modest charge into the top ten on the leaderboard. After he finished his round of 2-over-par 72 in the morning, players above him in the standings started dropping like water balloons from the Delta House fraternity porch. Henley, ranked seventh in the world, lost strokes to par but actually improved his position on the leaderboard from his opening even-par 70.

Former Open champ Jon Rahm of Spain shot 75 and was suffering from OFS—Oakmont Frustration Syndrome. (Researchers are still looking for a cure. Send money.) “I didn’t play bad, I played quite good golf,” Rahm said. “Didn’t see anything go in beside a 7-footer. That’s it. That’s a very hard thing to deal with to try to shoot a score out here.”

Asked to put his score into perspective, given the course’s difficulty level, Rahm answered, “Honestly, I’m too annoyed and mad right now to think about any perspective. Very few rounds of golf I played in my life where I think I hit good putts and they didn’t sniff the hole. Very frustrated.”

This is pretty much what the USGA and Oakmont had in mind for the course setup. John Bodenhamer, the USGA’s Chief of Championships, delivered the usual warning Wednesday before the tournament began. “Our mantra is tough but fair,” he said. “And what does that mean? It’s not about the score, it’s about getting every club in a player’s bag dirty, all 15 of them—the 14 in their bags and the one between their ears.”

Is it too early to declare Mission Accomplished on that this week? No, it is not. Exhibit A was Thursday’s opening round when Patrick Reed recorded an albatross on the 4th hole. The former Masters champ was asked about his historic shot and gave a snippy answer.

“There’s 71 other holes we have to play,” he barked. “One hole doesn’t mean jack, to be honest with you.”

The questioner was apparently unaware that Reed had just triple-bogeyed his final hole a few moments earlier. So he played that hole and his albatross hole in even par. Asking a tour player any question, no matter how complimentary, is a crapshoot if he doubled or tripled the last hole. A general golf writer rule: Just don’t do it. Leave him alone. Reed lightened up after a few answers but his sizzle was 100 percent understandable. Oakmont and OFS strikes again.

Scottie Scheffler, the No. 1 player in the world, had another day of struggling, including an unscheduled visit to the Church Pews bunkers. He shot 71, which left him seven shots behind 36-hole leader Sam Burns, who happens to be a close buddy of his. Two days of frustration boiled over for Scheffler, who went to the range in the mid-afternoon heat and humidity for a long session with coach Randy Smith in which Scheffler vented his frustration vocally. Scheffler striped it on the range, as usual, and, well, Saturday is a new day.

“It’s just about giving it your best on each shot,” Scheffler said. “There were times today where you feel like you could give up just based on how difficult the course is and how my swing was feeling. I barely pull a shot on 11, there’s a lot of places that ball could end up. I thought it could end up in the fairway and it ends up in a place where I don’t have a swing. So am I going to get mad about it, get frustrated or chip out and see what I can do from there? That’s what a lot of today was about.”

Scheffler nailed it, the answer is the stuff of cliches but it’s true in major championship golf. As Ben Hogan used to say, “The most important shot in golf is the next one.”

These players know that but sometimes, faced with adversity, they lose sight of it.

Norway’s Viktor Hovland shot 68 and is in third place. It’s not a coincidence that he kept his cool despite five birdies, an eagle, three bogeys and a double bogey.

“For some reason, I’ve been in a really nice mental state this week,” Hovland said., “Both my rounds have been very up and down. A couple of times if it would have happened at another tournament, I could have potentially lost my mind there a little bit.”

But it’s the U.S. Open. It’s not supposed to be fun. The only player who has fun that week is the winner… maybe.

Who’s going to win the U.S. Open? Not just anybody

By Gary VanSickle

OAKMONT, Pa.—Not just anybody can win a United States Open at mighty Oakmont Country Club.

Or so they say. It’s got to be one of the game’s best players, if not the best. (Insert Scottie Scheffler’s name here if you want.) The list of past champions says so, from Ben Hogan to Jack Nicklaus to Johnny Miller and Larry Nelson, Ernie Els, Angel Cabrera and Dustin Johnson.

Not so fast. Andrew Landry was right there in the mix in 2016. So was Frenchman Gregory Bourdy. And the antique version of Lee Westwood. Els barely held off Colin Montgomerie and Loren Roberts. Johnson outlasted, among others, Scott Piercy. And Miller’s 63 was nearly downgraded to a nice little round by John Schlee, who nearly chipped in on the final hole in 1973 to force a playoff. As Lanny Wadkins remembered it a few days ago in an interview, “Of all people, John Schlee.”

So it’s definitely not true that anybody can win a U.S. Open but pedigree doesn’t matter here. Hitting fairways and greens does.

Here are my Oakmont Open Power Rankings on who may win and why. Bet early and often. (And why not? It’s not my money you’re betting.)

One. Scottie Scheffler. Duh. Really, you shouldn’t need more than that. Reigning PGA Championship champ. Power Stick Rating: 98.6 (outta 100).

Two. Bryson DeChambeau. He’s No. 1 in the Tour Player Internet Content Provider Rankings, too. No matter how you feel about him, he is regularly in contention in the majors. You can look it up but you don’t have to, I did it for you: He finished 6th or better in five of the last six major championships, including the memorable Open win at Pinehurst last year and runnerup finishes in the last two PGA’s. He’s got the length to reach the 300-yard par-3 8th hole in one shot (a joke for the USGA’s chortling benefit) and the strength to maybe do something out of this industrial strength rhubarb-length rough. He can probably hit 2-iron all day and find fairways. Power Stick Rating (or PSR as insiders know it at the Spiranac Golf Institute): 96.2.

Three. Shane Lowry. The Irishman had a four-shot lead going into the final 18 here in 2016 but wasn’t able to bring it home. Our patented Power Stick Search Engine has determined that the Open champion will be the best iron player who finds the most fairways. Lowry ranks 28thin driving accuracy on the PGA Tour and, by the way, No. 1 in proximity to the hole with iron shots. He’s also an outstanding chipper. Putting? Not so much but at Oakmont, it’s more about two-putting for par than running in 25-footers for birdies. Unless it’s about running in 15-footers for pars, in which case you should’ve hit the green with your approach in the first place. PSR: 95.7.

Four. Sepp Straka. Your favorite Austrian (sorry, Arnold Schwarzenegger) doesn’t have much of a record yet in major championships. He’s oh-for-two in making the cut this year but he’s hotter than that Eggo waffle I accidentally forgot about in the toaster, with wins at the American Express and Truist Championships this year. Why he’s vaulted up the ol’ Power Stick is his accuracy. Straka ranks 11th in fairways hit and fifth in proximity to the hole. There’s more to winning a U.S. Open that stats but his numbers are a good place to start. Seems like he’s still trending upward on the ol’ Stardom Pole. He also looks unflappable, unlike his fellow Austrian Arnold, who vas, vell, very flappable vhen he vas rescuing Sarah Connor. Hey, everybody has to win their first major somewhere. PSR: 94.2.

Five. Collin Morikawa. This guy fits the profile of an Oakmont Open winner. He drives it straight, hits his irons close and putts decently. And he’s halfway to the Career Grand Slam with wins at the PGA and (British) Open Championship. So if he’s so good, why hasn’t he won anything at all since 2023? Yeah, well… He’s got to get out of his own way. But if you rank 2nd in driving accuracy and 8th in iron proximity, you’re a threat in any major championship. His last four U.S. Open finishes were 14th, 14th, 5th and 4th. He’s gotta be on your fantasy team or however you’re playing this Open at the Bushwood Casino. PSR: 92.9.

Six. Russell Henley. Surprise! You probably don’t know a thing about The Hen. He’s a gamer. (So he’s a Game Hen? No, never mind.) He’s 36, he’s a Georgia boy who played golf at the University of Georgia. Henley has five wins on the PGA Tour, including this year’s Arnold Palmer Invitational. He ranks 14th in driving accuracy and third in proximity with his irons. Henley seems to have found his footing in the last year or so and realized just how good he is. He finished seventh at last year’s Open and he’s all about playing golf and not about talking about himself. He’s quiet, cut in the mode of Hall of Famer Larry Nelson. Can he handle U.S. Open Sunday pressure? It’s time to find out. PSR: 90.8.

Seven. Rory McIlroy. Former Pittsburgh Steelers Coach Chuck Noll used to tell players, “If you’re thinking about retiring, you’re already retired.” McIlroy has bravely voiced his issues recently with complacency and pushing himself to keep going hard after that Masters win completed his Career Grand Slam. He is also tinkering with his driver setup and, ahem, Oakmont is not a place to tinker. It is completely understandable that any player might suffer a letdown after what McIlroy accomplished. Can he climb yet another mountain this week? If he finds fairways with his new driver, or whatever clubs he hits off the tee, look for the competitor in him to switch back on. Count him out at your own peril. PSR: 90.6.

Eight. Nick Taylor. This Canadian always gets his man (Legal Department: note trademark infringement on the Canadian Mounties catchphrase here) in playoffs. Taylor has five wins and a 3-0 record in PGA Tour playoffs. His Canadian Open win was so brilliant, the tournament made him into its official logo. Maybe Taylor can start a collection of National Open titles by adding one at Oakmont. He’s a solid player, pretty straight off the tee (17th, driving accuracy) and steady with his irons (18th, proximity to the hole) and he has come through repeatedly in clutch situations.

Nine. Jon Rahm. It is easy to forget about Rahm because he’s in the Witness Protection Program known as LIV Golf and is out of sight, out of mind. He has played steady golf at LIV but not his best golf. However, he seems to have turned a corner. He was seventh at last month’s PGA Championship and he’s built for U.S. Open golf. His last four Open finishes were 10th, 12th, 1st, 23rd and 3rd. Rahm is an auto-top-10 in LIV events and seems to have renewed interest in chasing the No. 1 player in the world again. PSR: 77.4 (number adjusted because LIV plays only 54 holes).

Ten. Keegan Bradley. This isn’t as crazy as it may sound. Bradley has played some of his best golf this season on some of the tour’s hardest tracks. He finished 5th at the API, where Bay Hill had formidable rough; 8th at the PGA Championship, where Quail Hollow was just about zero fun; and 7th at the Memorial Tournament, which could just as easily have held the U.S. Open that week at Muirfield Village Golf Club. Maybe there’s something about being the U.S. Ryder Cup captain that has inspired him or, who knows, taken his mind off his own game enough to free himself up. As for the potential dilemma of being a playing captain in a Ryder Cup, there’s no dilemma. Each captain already has about 14 assistant captains now. It’s not like the old days when, gee, one assistant captain sufficed. They’ve got a captain for everything now, from foursomes to party favors to snack crackers. He did win a PGA Championship an eon ago early in his career and, not that he’d ever say it, but wouldn’t it be nice to stick to the previous Ryder Cup captain who passed over him two years ago to pick his tour pals instead and get waxed in Italy? PSR: 89.9.

Is Rory Just Starting Another Series of Major Wins?

By Gary Van Sickle

OAKMONT, Pa.—Rory McIlroy has always reminded me a little of David Duval, a former No. 1 player in the world.

Not their swings or their golf games, which were very different. But both are intelligent, literate and have other interests outside of golf. Normal, in other words, not obsessed with only golf.

I remember when Duval was once asked why he didn’t practice more, although I forget why that topic came up, but he said, “How many perfect 6-iron shots in a row do I have to hit?”

He also described how he woke up the next day after finally landing a major championship, the Open, and wondered, “Is that all there is?”

When McIlroy completed the Career Grand Slam in April by winning the Masters, his first major title in 11 years, he completed a dream and a mission rolled into one. Complacency after great success is human nature. Even Arnold Palmer admitted, in Michael Bamberger’s excellent “Men In Green” book, that he lost his edge after winning the 1960 U.S. Open in style at Cherry Hills. Palmer kept winning majors for a few more years but he did it knowing that something he used to have, whatever it was, was gone.

It would be easy to write of McIlroy and psychologically fat and happy after this Masters win. His play since April has been lackluster. Is that disinterest or is he merely having driver issues? McIlroy said he learned something at the recent RBC Canadian Open and when pressed for details, answered, “I learned I wasn’t using the right driver.” So he switched from one TaylorMade driver model to a different TaylorMade driver.

It might be as simple as that. McIlroy entered this year with three stated goals and that was to complete the Slam, become the greatest player in European history and win one more Ryder Cup in the U.S.. Well, he’s already nailed down two of the three. Now he’s trying to sort out what drives him and how much fun time at home with his wife and young daughter, Poppy, he is willing to give up to continue playing the best golf of his life.

There is no guidebook to work from for this. McIlroy will have to make it up as he goes. The fact that he even talks to the media about this, admits that it’s hard to keep pushing when he has accomplished so much, could be healing. It’s the elephant in the room only one wearing a green jacket.

What’s your plan for moving on from the Career Slam, he was asked? “I don’t have one. I have no idea,” he admitted. “Look, you dream about the final putt going in at the Masters but you don’t think about what comes next.”

He hopes to have “a little bit of amnesia” to forget about that Masters summit and “find the motivation to go back out there and work as hard as I’ve been working,” he said. From October until April this year, he geared up and steeled himself to prepare for the Masters.

“I’ve always been a player who struggles to play after I win whatever tournament,” he said. “I always struggle to show up with motivation the next week because I’ve just accomplished something and I want to enjoy it and sort of relish achieving a goal. Chasing a certain goal for the better part of a decade and a half, I think I’m allowed a little time to relax. But here at Oakmont, I certainly can’t relax this week.”

McIlroy arrived in Augusta last April with great expectations. Is it possible that arriving with low expectations, or no expectations, is easier? He can free-wheel it this week at Oakmont. He has nothing to lose and nothing to prove.

It’s not as if he has forgotten how to hit a 340-drive or hit a fade since then. Scottie Scheffler is the world’s top player and the man to beat this week. McIlroy has been off form in his last few outings but does that really matter in the wake of climbing the mountain he climbed at the Masters?

I probably wouldn’t bet any money on Rory to win this week. I also would not discount him, either. He’s still got it, the talent is still there.

Really, how many perfect 6-iron shots in a row does a man have to hit?

Read Gary's story on Forrest Fezler Who Changed into Shorts at the 1983 U.S. Open

PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania — So many players have made golfing history at Oakmont Country Club during the nine U.S. Opens played there.

Johnny Miller. Sam Parks. Jack Nicklaus. Arnold Palmer. Ernie Els. Larry Nelson. Forrest Fezler and ...

Wait. Forrest who?

Fezler was a PGA Tour regular in the 1970s and early 1980s. He made a rebellious gesture in the last round of the 1983 U.S. Open, fitting in a city where the Pittsburgh Steelers’ game-day tradition includes blasting Styx’s “Renegade” on the scoreboard sound system.

Fezler was a renegade when he became the first player to wear shorts in the U.S. Open — or any pro tournament for that matter......

Read the rest here: https://thefirstcall.substack.com/p/the-long-and-shorts-of-forrest-fezlers?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=732523&post_id=165312956&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1f3pg0&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

Read Kathy's story on Pro Golf Now: NBC announce team shuns Rory McIlroy during their U.S. Open preview

https://progolfnow.com/nbc-announce-team-shuns-rory-mcilroy-during-2025-us-open-preview?utm_campaign=FanSided+Daily&utm_source=FanSided+Daily&utm_medium=email&sc=1ef73b93702dfde0be1539163485bcfe204ade7d9b2956dada1dea28208a8a57

by gary van sickle

McIlroy Brings Career Slam Home

AUGUSTA, Ga.—It was a Monday unlike any other 18 years ago in the Open Championship at Scotland’s Carnoustie Golf Links.

Seve Ballesteros, Europe’s greatest and most electrifying player, walked into the press center at Championship and announced the unthinkable. The Spaniard, considered Europe’s Arnold Palmer for his swashbuckling style of play and panache, said he was making the painful decision to retire. Those Ryder Cup heroics, those Open Championships, those Green Jackets--there would officially be no more.

Seve’s departure was a hole that surely would never be filled. Seve fit the description that former Open Championship winner said years later about Tiger Woods, that Tiger wasn’t one in a million, he was “one in ever.”

European golf would never be the same. That was proven three days later at Carnoustie when a mop-haired amateur from little-known Holywood, Northern Ireland, shot 68 in the opening round, one better than Tiger, his childhood hero. The lad was 18, he went on to win the silver medal as low amateur that week. His name was Rory McIlroy. No one knew it at the time, although some hoped, but the torch of European golf had thus been passed ever so neatly.

Eighteen years later, McIlroy finally landed his white whale, winning the greatest Masters Tournament of all time. With apologies to Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods, there has never been a Masters like this one. It ended with McIlroy tapping in a two-foot birdie putt on the first extra hole, the word “tapping” being completely insufficient to describe the effort. Given the circumstances, it might have been the hardest two-footer in Augusta National history. (All right, apologies now to Scott Hoch, too.)

You would realize the moment’s significance because after the ball dropped, McIlroy threw his head back, flipped his putter to Butler Cabin or the Savannah River or thereabouts and fell to his knees, alternately sobbing and shouting in exultation. Not since Ben Crenshaw won in 1996 after the death of his mentor, Harvey Penick, has a Masters champion been so overcome with emotion.

“For Rory to win the Masters after what’s happened to him in previous Masters—it’s very difficult when you’ve had so many chances to win it and you’ve struggled,” six-time Masters champ Jack Nicklaus told Golf Channel shortly after the finish. “Rory struggled today a lot. He struggled throughout the week but he kept coming back. The mistakes he made didn’t defeat him, they spurred him to play better. That’s what is so sensational about it.”

McIlroy led the Masters after 54 holes in 2011 as a 22-year-old. On the 10thtee, he snap-hooked a drive into the trees left and saw it carom deep into the trees near the club’s cabins. Unsettled by that, he shot 80 and didn’t win. He was second going into the final round in 2018 and shot 74. He let the 2023 U.S. Open at Los Angeles Country Club slip through his fingers and did it again last year at Pinehurst when he missed short putts on the closing holes.

He needed a Masters title to become the sixth player to win the Career Grand Slam, a feat not accomplished since Tiger Woods in 2000. There were other lost tournaments, too, and McIlroy went 11 years since winning his last major. Once on track to chase history after four majors in four years, McIlroy stalled. It was inconceivable, given his talent. Over the past decade, the combined component grew into unbearable pressure.

“Rory wasn’t thinking about the Grand Slam, he was thinking about the Masters,” Nicklaus said. “If you gave him his choice of a Career Grand Slam or win the Masters, he’d say the Masters 100 percent of the time.”

So what happened Sunday was that McIlroy won the wildest, greatest, most amazing Masters of all time to get a Green Jacket, get the Career Grand Slam and, by the way, surpass Ballesteros as the greatest European golfer of all-time. McIlroy’s five majors don’t match Seve’s six or Nick Faldo’s six and McIlroy is part of a bigger sixsome. He joins Nicklaus, Woods, Gene Sarazen, Gary Player and Ben Hogan and the only men who have Slammed Grandly. If that doesn’t make him the G.O.A.T. (Greatest Of All Time), what does?

If you watched McIlroy shoot a closing 73 that was either the ugliest 73 you’ve ever seen or the prettiest 73 you’ve ever witnessed, you might not feel like he’s the GOAT-iest. He followed brilliant shotmakiing with awful mistakes and vise versa in his back-and-forth path to victory Sunday.

McIlroy came to the 72nd hole with a one-shot edge over Justin Rose and a perfect tee shot in the middle of the 18thfairway, not the easiest shot for McIlroy. The 18th hole calls for a fade and he likes to hit a hard draw. He executed it to perfection, however. Then he had a simple 125-yard gap wedge to the green. Give him 100 tries when the Masters isn’t at stake, not to mention the Slam and personal vindication, and he hits that green 99 and a half times.

This time, beyond belief after his earlier gaffes, he dumped the shot in the right bunker. His bunker shot was superb, or so it seemed, but the softer ball that McIlroy has been using this year, a key part to his improved play, checked up and left him a five-footer for the Masters. It wasn’t quite what would be considered gimmie range and McIlroy proved it. He pulled it offline to the left Watch his stroke in slow-motion and you’ll see that on his forward stroke, he lifted the putter dramatically, causing it to shut slightly and send the putt offline.

That was a movie McIlroy had already starred in earlier. He took a four-shot lead to the 13th hole, smartly laid up, then stupidly fanned his 82-yard wedge shot into Rae’s Creek when it bounced off a bank. How is a former No. 1 player in the world capable of such boneheadness? This is exactly how major championships turn to Jell-O and slip through a man’s grasp. McIlroy turned a certain par and likely birdie into a double bogey. He hit a weak pitch shot at 14, where he missed the green, and missed that par putt, too. Not to worry, he hit the tournament’s signature shot at the next, a majestic 7-iron to five feet for the eagle that would surely ice his win.

Then he missed that putt left, too. The birdie got him into a tie with Rose but he edged ahead again with a brilliant shot in tight for birdie at 17. Another lead, followed by the aforementioned fiasco at 18.

The guy who hit those towering shots under pressure, yes, is the GOAT of European golf. And he’s only 36, there is more to come. Of course, we thought that in 2014 when he won a PGA Championship in the dark at Valhalla and were trying to guess what year he’d catch Tiger in major victories. The correct answer turned out to be, Never.

Meanwhile, life happened. He broke off an engagement with a famous tennis star after the marriage invitations had already been sent out. He found a new love, became a father and kept coming close in majors but finding ways not to win them. He won other events, and lost other events. The Masters remained elusive. He kept working, kept believing and kept improving, not always in a steady straight line. But always trending upward.

“I’ve carried that burden since 2014,” McIlroy said. “Watchign a lot of my peeers get green jackets, it’s been difficult. I’ve tried to be positive every time. Today was difficult. There were points on the bak nine where I thought, Have I let this slip again? I responded with some clutch shot, I’m really proud of that. It’s been an emotionally draining week.”

A true measure of a man’s legacy is his family and friends. His wife and daughter waited for McIlroy, red-faced with tears by the time he staggered off the 18th green and received hugs and handshakes from friends and men in green jackets and his caddie, Harry Diamond, who had an arm wrapped around him. It was a long, long receiving line as McIlroy made his way to the clubhouse. One friend after another. Then Shane Lowry, another Irishman, former Open champion and good friend. Tommy Fleetwood, a fellow Ryder Cupper. Other players’ wives. The other European players and McIlroy are a true band of brothers, bonded by that Cup.

Some buddies shouted congratulations as he neared the end of the line and McIlroy told them, “I’ve gotta go get a green jacket.” He said it with a giddy voice that made it sound like he was popping in to Stein Mart to buy one.

In his locker before the final round, McIlroy opened a note from Angel Cabrera, a former Masters champ, who wished him good luck and urged him to play well. Cabrera was paired with the young McIlroy when he came apart in that 2011 Masters. “That was ironic,” McIlroy said. “That was a nice touch.”

The Masters fans were behind McIlroy as they had never been. They knew his history of near misses, they knew he was close to the Grand Slam. They wanted to see history made, of course, but McIlroy’s failures had turned him into something of an underdog, much like New York golf fans got behind Phil Mickelson early in his career when he had yet to win a major championship. When his double bogey at the 13th hole was posted on the outdoor leaderboard facing the 18thgreen, the gallery screamed in anguish, many fans holding their hands on their heads in disbelief.

Sunday, it all came together in a strange finish and a strange package. Rose made 10 birdies in the final round. Former champ Patrick Reed vaulted into the picture briefly after he holed a shot on one bounce for eagle at the 17th. Swede Ludvig Aberg was two missed makable putts away from swiping this title, one year after he finished second in his first Masters. Bryson DeChambeau struggled and was on the edge of contention until the last four holes. There will be no Sunday at the 89th Master for dummies. There was so much more than these contenders, no simple narrative. It was a day of knots and twists and reversals and surprise.

But really, it was all about McIlroy. He beat his pursuers but more than that, he beat the golf course and he finally defeated his biggest foe, himself, and all those demons who’d been renting space in his head.

CBS host Jim Nantz is allowed some poetic hyperbole after this one. “The gravity of something as rare, rare history,” he said, “he joins the most prestigious club in the game. Yes, for Rory, it was an enormous weight to bear. Those six have all reached golf immortality. Now there's a new name on the list.”

Immortality. History. Golf lore. That’s all a bit much. What was witnessed on this memorable day was something simpler. McIlroy said it during his winner’s press conference.

“Now I know I’m coming back here every year,” he said in a dreamy tone as if he didn’t quite believe the green sleeves already covering his arms. “Which is lovely.”

Ballesteros, who passed away from cancer in 2011, would be proud. The torch of European golf still burns bright in the hands of that young Northern Ireland lad who eclipsed him. In fact, it’s burning brighter than ever.

Photo credit: Masters champion Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland celebrates with the Masters trophy during the Green Jacket Presentation Ceremony after winning the Masters at Augusta National Golf Club, Sunday, April 13, 2025. Photo credit: Simon Bruty Courtesy Augusta National Golf Club.

The sun rose here at two minutes after seven ...

By Gary Van Sickle AUGUSTA, Ga.

AUGUSTA, Ga.—The sun rose here at two minutes after seven but the stars were already out.

The constellation of Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson shined as brightly as ever 23 minutes later when they gathered on a brisk morning to kick off the 89th Masters Tournament as the Honorary Starters. It started beneath a clear sky the color of azure. The sun, while brightening, was hidden behind the Augusta National clubhouse and tall pines.

This moment of golf lore is not about the legends’ tee shots, which were surprisingly good. Or about noticing their struggles to simply bend over and put a tee in the ground. Nicklaus teetered precariously as he tried to do it and after succeeding, he made a triumphant gesture, drawing applause from a large gallery crowding around the first tee.

When it was Watson’s turn, he bent down to plant his tee and joked, “It’s not so easy for me to get down here, either.” Nicklaus promptly quipped, “You want me to help?” That brough laughs from the spectators who were close enough to hear the byplay. Watson grinned, straightened up, got into his familiar position of address and then ripped a pretty good drive down the fairway. And why not? He was the kid in this group at 75 years of age.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Masters chairman Fred Ridley announced on the tee box, “the 89th Masters is officially under way.”

We’ve seen this show before, of course, but it never gets old. Only the stars do. Before the men arrived at the tee, the moment when the Masters Tournament gets real has already happened. That’s when a club official slides the nameplates into the sign board by the tee markers. First, the Gary Player card, followed by his number, 89. That’s his age and what a nice coincidence that he has lived as many years as there are Masters. Then, the Jack Nicklaus placard slips into place, followed by his number, 85. Finally, Tom Watson, 75.

There were a few murmurs among the gallery as the names were put in place. But mostly, the process was accompanied by reverential silence and whispering. When the names go up, even calloused Masters observers feel a tingle, a chill or a thrill. It’s not just about the chance to get another look at three of the game’s greatest players, it’s that the Masters Tournament is about to start, nearly nine months after the previous major last July, the Open Championship.

What this moment is about is tradition, a cornerstone of the Masters; giving these past champions a chance to have an encore and take a bow; and measuring the passage of time.

Aging and its ultimate finale is a topic usually avoided but we all know its there. The Honorary Starters are on borrowed time. Realistically, we all are. Arnold Palmer has come and gone. So have past Honorary Starters such as Gene Sarazen, Byron Nelson and Sam Snead. In the 1980s, Sarazen and Snead used to play all 18 holes until Sarazen’s shoulder began to bother him too much. Then they played only nine, which the still-limber Snead usually grumped about.

One year, Sarazen made a 60-foot putt across the eighth green for a par. Moments like that, and like the tee shots now, allow patrons the opportunity to close their eyes and imagine it’s 1935 again. Or 1950. Or whatever glory years they want to recall.

The elephant in the interview room after the ceremony was aging and the future. How many more tee shots will we see Nicklaus hit? How many times will we watch Player, now slightly hunched, walk to the tee with that familiar combination of bounce and swagger in his step? How many more rhythmic swings by Watson will be be fortunate enough to enjoy?

We know what’s coming eventually but these tee shots, as insignificant as they are, provide comfort. It means these legends are still here on Earth, right now, and so are we. All is therefore well. The world remains in its normal axis.

Player, a renowned fitness advocate, broached the subject of mortality when he was asked the last time he’d eaten fast food. His face practically beamed when he was given the chance to get on one of his favorite soapboxes. He is a man of unlimited energy, full of knowledge gained over the years that he can’t wait to share. And he loves the topic of health.

“Well, you don’t reach 90 as I do if you eat a bunch of crap, I can tell you that,” Player told a room of media types, drawing the laughter he expected. “But that’s your choice. Everybody has a choice. I want to live to 100 because I love people. I love golf. I love life.

“I’ve got a young girlfriend, I’ve changed my life. How about that, at 90, finding a girlfriend? Tom is not as old as me but he’s also found a new one. I’ll tell you all, you or your wife is going to die, and it’s not the end of life. So many people get so disheartened that they don’t think they should continue life. The greatest gift bestowed upon a man or woman is life. so my ambition is to reach 100. I went to India and met a gerontologist. He gave me 11 things to work on, which I adhere to. So I might drop dead tomorrow but I’m giving it a hell of a try.”

There was more merriment following that last line. Watson was asked if he wanted to add anything but he smiled broadly and held up his hands, palms out, in the internationally recognized sign that means stop.

The trio discussed other topics. They included the usual things, such as the LIV Golf-PGA Tour divide. Watson said the obvious part out loud, that he didn’t foresee any possible agreement between the parties because of their differences but he liked what Scottie Scheffler said at Tuesday night’s champions dinner, “I’m glad we’re all together again.”

The men made self-deprecating comments about the actual act of hitting a tee shot in front of a gallery.

“Make sure I don’t trip,” Nicklaus said, describing his pre-shot thoughts. “The second one is make sure I get the tee in the ground without falling over. And the third one is, just don’t kill anybody. Don’t laugh too much about that. That’s actually the thought I have.”

Watson said his only thought was to get the shot airborne. Player loves playing the role of orator and he does it so well. He considered a bigger picture.

“You walk out there and the enthusiasm as I’m walking through that first tee experience—the word that comes to mind is gratitude,” he said. “I’m standing here for the 67th time. It’s an honor to be at this, as the Scottish people say, ‘dost grund,’ the holy ground.”

That description fits Augusta National to perfection. It is a venerable, special place for golf.

The early 7:25 a.m. tee time for the trio was unusual, caused by a slightly larger-than-usual field of 95 players. Nicklaus was asked the last time he’d risen before sunrise to hit a golf ball.

“Last year,” he quipped.

He likely won’t do it again until next year’s Masters. We’ll be another year older then, when they return here on a Thursday morning. Maybe the stars will shine on us one more time.

Photo of Jack and Barbara Nicklaus by David Paul Morris --- Courtesy Augusta National GC

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